Editor's note: This story is the second part in a two-part series about efforts to revive the Valley's canals. Last Sunday, we looked at the history and decline of the canals. In this installment, we look at growing efforts to develop and beautify the waterways.

Swallows gracefully twist and glide a few inches above the foamy water, catching ­insects to feed a mistuned symphony of chicks squawking in mud nests nearby.

Their acrobatics come in sudden bursts, providing a show for bikers and joggers cruising the banks of the ­Arizona Canal as it curves past the gnarled ridges of Piestewa Peak.

The birds' rhythm is interrupted only occasionally by a giant leaping carp, its green and white scales almost ­prehistoric-looking. Splashing water ripples through a ­reflection of the white dome of a Greek Orthodox cathedral on the canal's west bank.

Tammy Bosse often thinks of this stretch of water. She's mesmerized by the tranquility but frustrated by the missed opportunity.

The barren concrete and gravel landscape is efficient for trail users and delivering water.

But Bosse imagines a canal lined with towering eucalyptus and acacia trees, colorful public-art installations and shade awnings. People stroll past boutique storefronts or stop to relax on benches and restaurant patios facing the waterway where it intersects major streets.

It's a vision of a canal system that Bosse has been thinking about since the late 1980s, when she first heard it described during one of former Mayor Terry Goddard's Futures Forums. The concept was to use the canals to create a stronger sense of place.

"It's so much greater than just water flowing through going to water people's orange trees," Bosse said. "It's part of what we do to make our city a place where people want to be and stay. This whole idea of creating community is very intertwined."

She thinks of the canals much the way they used to be.

Up until about 50 years ago, the canals were a community focal point, where residents gathered in the shade under tall cottonwood trees lining banks or splashed in the water to cool off during the hot summer months.

By the late 20th century, though, that sense was largely gone. The canals became the back alleys of the region.

Today, most of metro Phoenix still turns away from its canal banks. Yet many say it's counterintuitive for a desert metropolis to ignore an asset like flowing water.

The idea of creating public spaces around the canals isn't new — it has come up and fizzled several times over the past three decades. Some improvements have been made in places — including one major development project — even as much of the canal system still evokes images of gravel and trash.

In the past year, however, a new groundswell of interest has emerged as Phoenix launched an effort to plan for development along two stretches of the Grand Canal near the light-rail corridor. And this time, canal users and advocates say the momentum is in their favor.

Nan Ellin, a former professor at Arizona State University, got residents and bureaucrats to envision a new future for the canals five years ago. As she walked the waterways near her home in central Phoenix, she came up with the concept for "canalscape," envisioning bustling urban hubs that combine desert landscapes and public gathering spaces around the waterfronts.

The idea seemed to be gaining steam in 2009 when Ellin and a group of urban-planning students released a book with vivid illustrations depicting potential canal projects. Packed audiences celebrated the concept at lectures, and the key players seemed willing to sit at the table.

Then, the full brunt of the economic downturn hit and the effort seemed to lose the attention of residents and city planners. It also hit roadblocks with Salt River Project, the Valley utility that operates the canals and has to value its role as a water-delivery system above other purposes.

"More than frustration, I would say it was impatience," said Ellin, who now chairs the Department of City & Metropolitan Planning at the University of Utah. "Everyone is on board. Why isn't it happening?"

But around the time Ellin's plans hit a snag, a different kind of canal project with ingredients similar to her vision was coming to fruition a few miles to the east.

Commercial success

Towering luxury condominiums, crowded restaurant patios and public plazas look out over the tree-lined banks of the Arizona Canal as it flows through downtown Scottsdale.

Well-dressed tourists stroll along the canal, stopping to lean over the decorative railing and stare at giant, florescent-green insects floating on the water — the latest installation of floating public art. Brushed-steel pylons of a pedestrian bridge glimmer in the sun nearby, the work of the late world-renowned architect Paolo Soleri.

In the late 1990s, the Scottsdale Waterfront existed only in the minds of city planners and developers. Now, it's the only example of a large canal-oriented commercial development that's succeeded in the Valley.

The Scottsdale Waterfront area sprang to life in 2007, and residents moved into two exclusive condo towers. Construction has continued over the years, with the final phase breaking ground last year.

Along the way, Scottsdale spent at least $30 million from city coffers to help transform the canal area. Builders reshaped it from a trapezoidal cross-section to one with vertical edges, so pedestrians can lean over the railings and peer straight down at the water. The city also paid to bury power lines and line the canal with palms and native trees.

In the end, some say difficulties coordinating portions of the project in the canal right of way nearly soured SRP on the notion of assisting canal-adjacent development altogether.

Jim Duncan has been the utility's point person on canal issues since the early 1990s, overseeing the entirety of the Scottsdale project. He said the grandiose endeavor forced SRP to examine an internal culture that resisted any changes to the canal banks.

"If you were a maintenance foreman for SRP and your charge was to maintain the canal bank, you probably weren't real excited about the idea of all these amenities showing up that you had to work around," Duncan said.

Because the canals serve a vital utilitarian function, as the Valley's largest source of drinking water, SRP was naturally cautious about change.

Scottsdale and SRP eventually found balance and compromise, however challenging. The utility agreed to improvements on the canal banks and some restaurant patios that overlap the roughly 50-foot right of way. SRP considered the waterfront project a unique scenario, unlike other areas.

"We experienced a lot of growing pains through that project," Duncan said. "It is so different. Literally, the canal itself is different."

In the end, the crowds of shoppers and diners found along the waterfront on any given weekend would be the signs of success.

Developer Fred Unger, who built the SouthBridge project across the canal from the waterfront, looked out over the canal recently from a balcony off his top-floor office. "Thursday nights, this is like the Ponte Vecchio bridge in Florence," he says.

At the same time, some advocates who call for more civic life along the canals criticize Scottsdale's efforts, particularly the waterfront on the north bank. They say its high-rises and shopping-mall vibe are too manufactured, and the complicated, decorative construction isn't practical on any larger scale.

They're still working on a larger solution that brings Phoenix back to its canals.

A rendering depicts ideas for development along the Grand Canal in central Phoenix. Rendering by Dan Bartman

Walkers use the path along the canal near Fifth Avenue and Goldwater on Saturday, March 29, 2014 in Scottsdale. The city recently completed improvement of the canal path from Goldwater Boulevard to 60th Street at the Phoenix border. Stacie Scott/The Republic

The canal near Fifth Avenue and Goldwater is pictured in Scottsdale. The city recently completed improvement of the canal path from Goldwater Boulevard to 60th Street at the Phoenix border. Stacie Scott/The Republic

The canal near Fifth Avenue and Goldwater in Scottsdale. The city recently completed improvement of the canal path from Goldwater Boulevard to 60th Street at the Phoenix border. Stacie Scott/The Republic

Children swim in a lateral of the Grand Canal. Swimming in the canals was common until the 1960s, when pools become more popular and changes to the infrastructure of the canals made the waterways more treacherous. SRP

Rover Villasenor watches people run and bike the Grand Canal under Loop 202 on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. Villasenor, retired, walks to a spot in the shade and uses the canal for some exercise. Patrick Breen/The Republic

Keith Hack rides his bike under Loop 202 along the Grand Canal on his way from work on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. Hack said he has ridden the trails along the canal since before there was even concrete, just dirt. Patrick Breen/The Republic

Rover Villasenor watches people run and bike the Grand Canal under Loop 202 on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. Villasenor, retired, walks to a spot in the shade and uses the canal for some exercise. Patrick Breen/The Republic

Birds swim nearby trash in the Grand Canal on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. The group, Arizona Forward, looks to improve the canals and make them a prominent feature of the city, instead of the back-alleys most see them as today. Patrick Breen/The Republic

Andrea Smith rides the Grand Canal near Loop 202 on her way to her job in Tempe on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. She thought the canal could use more lights for people who ride or walk during the evenings. Patrick Breen/The Republic

Andrea Smith rides the Grand Canal near Loop 202 on her way to her job in Tempe on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. She thought the canal could use more lights for people who ride or walk during the evenings. Patrick Breen/The Republic

The sun rises over the Grand Canal and a grocery cart near some graffiti on Jan. 24, 2014, in Phoenix. Cleaning up the canal is one of the major focuses of groups looking to improve their quality. Patrick Breen/The Republic

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It wasn't just urban planners and developers who had begun looking at the Valley's waterways anew.

In the mid-1990s, broader public perception about the canals started changing. People wanted to be outdoors to bike, jog and stroll along the water, and they wanted amenities along the way.

Cities across the metro area, especially the East Valley suburbs, began to push for more access to canal banks. SRP gradually let landscaping, public art and paved trails be constructed, and the trend accelerated over the past decade. As Duncan put it, they realized the "world doesn't come to an end because there's a paved trail."

Alfred Simon, a professor of architecture and planning at the University of New Mexico, wrote his 2002 doctoral dissertation on the development of the Valley's canal network.

Simon said much of SRP's early resistance to canal recreation, and later development, is partially a result of a broader post-World War II cultural mind-set that primarily valued efficiency in the construction of infrastructure without regard to the impact on urban environments.

During the 1950s and '60s, SRP transformed meandering, earthen canals into utilitarian channels with steep banks. To save water, the canals were lined with concrete, and the shade trees that once grew alongside were cut down.

"We got efficiency all right, and we lost a landscape," Simon laments. "The paradigm of the postwar era simply didn't recognize that."

In more recent decades, Simon said, a growing environmental awareness emerged and residents started looking at the consequences of rapid growth. And, SRP's approach warmed to new proposals.

Tammy Bosse and other residents of east Phoenix's Arcadia neighborhood started demanding more than just trails along the canals. They organized and got SRP and the city to revive Arizona Falls, a natural 20-foot drop in the Arizona Canal that had long been covered by a dormant power plant.

Arizona Falls was reborn as a hybrid between a public-arts project and small hydroelectric plant. Families now gather under sheets of water that fall from its steel aqueducts.

The Valley had started reclaiming its lost public-gathering spaces.

Finding a balance

The discussion is tense at times as city planners, community activists, idealistic architects and SRP's Duncan sit around a large table at a conference room in midtown Phoenix.

There's back and forth over key issues.

How can we add more trees? Shade is crucial for the canal experience. But trees bring problems. Architects in the room push for native trees, similar to the cottonwoods that once lined the canals. But Duncan jumps in to say SRP needs its right of way.

What about crosswalks? Many canal crossings don't have any, and pedestrians dart dangerously between speeding cars. But a consensus is elusive. The group debates special paint, flashing lights or other traffic signals.

Things still aren't perfect, but everyone was back at the table late last monthas Phoenix dove into a major planning effort to reinvent the urban corridor along its light rail.

Dubbed Reinvent PHX, the project includes plans to transform areas where the canal crosses rail, creating those long-envisioned canalscapes. Residents who've commented on the planning effort have listed canals as their top priority.

In the center of the room, Ellin sits quietly, nodding her head as she listens to the discussion. She's flown back into town for Reinvent PHX meetings, and she sees a new momentum taking shape.

With a Zen-like demeanor, she tries to find a balance between SRP and community stakeholders wanting more. She suggests that complicated "canal enhancement" projects like the Scottsdale Waterfront aren't the only way — that "canal-oriented" development can occur exclusively on the private property adjacent to canals. SRP wouldn't have to be part of the equation.

"Honestly, I think we've both gotten better," Ellin says later. "We said, 'Yes, you're doing very important work and we won't get in the way.' "

Duncan also sounds increasingly more open to compromise. He puts things in a historical context, admitting improvements that exist along the canal today seemed unimaginable 20 years ago. SRP keeps evolving.

On the wall of the meeting room hangs illustrations depicting potential plans for the canal banks near Sky Harbor International Airport: Hotels, boutique shops, cafes and public plazas face inward to the waterway at the ground level. Buildings might also include mixed uses, such as office space below condos or affordable apartments.

Curt Upton, a Phoenix city planner, says the process is just the beginning, but it could ultimately remove many of the barriers to such canal-oriented development.

Once the city finishes drawing and envisioning options for the canal banks, planners will know what zoning rules or other regulations might need to be changed. They also will know how many millions of dollars it could take in infrastructure upgrades or incentives to make it happen.

Though the city faces a budget deficit today, Upton says it's important to remember that these things require a long-range vision. The city wants to be ready when grant money comes available or the right developer comes along.

Celebrating canal

Mayor Greg Stanton grew up playing along canals in west Phoenix. He and his brother would attempt to jump their BMX bikes over a side ditch, imagining they were daredevil Evel Knievel. They usually just ended up in the water.

Their neighborhood ditch was eventually piped and buried underground.

Today, Stanton shares a vision for a canal system that's inviting, though he concedes change can be slow.

"It needs to be an active asset, not a passive asset," he says. "We want to bring life and community to our canal system, if you will, in a much larger way than we have today."

And it's not just Phoenix pushing for change. SRP is quietly working with a developer on plans for a canal-oriented development at the final phase of Papago Park Center in north Tempe near Loop 202.

The details haven't been announced, but officials have said the plan involves altering the path of the Grand Canal so it winds through the middle of a mixed-use development.

The concept is to celebrate the canal rather than cover it up, as proposed in the past.

The project could also involve a water feature that mimics Theodore Roosevelt Dam, the massive stone project — built a century ago — that allowed the canal system to thrive.

The turnabout comes as SRP and the city notice changes happening in the way people think about the canals.

Vision for future

Inside the library of St. Francis Xavier Elementary in central Phoenix, a group of several dozen students from schools on both sides of the Grand Canal are illustrating their visions for the waterway.

Those from expensive, neatly adorned high schools on the north side of the bank, Brophy College Preparatory and Xavier College Preparatory, have rarely interacted with their counterparts at Central High School on the south. But the prep- and public-school students are getting along just fine.

Initially, the students were skeptical about their months-long project to study and brainstorm ideas for the canal near Central Avenue and Steele Indian School Park.

Students wanted bridges, public art and trees to enhance the canal and connect their schools. They started insisting that leaders from Arizona Forward, an association of business and civic leaders sponsoring their project, do more to make their ideas reality.

Arizona Forward has been pushing the canalscape vision since Ellin left in 2010.

As part of the project with the schools, the association and environmental architects Stephen Thompson and Lynette Pollari have developed conceptual plans for bridges and other enhancements on the Grand Canal. They're hopeful the city will fund the initial infrastructure upgrades.

"We're kind of, let's just say, shovel-ready," said Diane Brossart, ­association president. "We also have the political and community will."

A few blocks west of the schools, new homeowners Sean Hitch and Roger McFadden are landscaping the yard outside their renovated brick bungalow on the canal banks. For them, the waterfront was a selling point, not an eyesore.

Shortly after they bought the house, someone spray-painted graffiti on the brick wall between their backyard and the canal.

Hitch was annoyed but not deterred. He painted over the graffiti and planted a wall of colorful cactuses and desert shrubs, hoping to deter vandals and provide a more appealing sight for canal users passing by.

Like the students down the way, Hitch is a believer — a believer in the canal spaces that could be.

"I know it's potential, not where it's at," he says, looking at the water flowing past his backyard. "That's hard for some people to do, to see the potential instead."